I love to learn. I love to write. But I grow disgusted with myself for not retaining more of the information I read and not finishing the projects I set out to write. How do you overcome this saturation of knowledge? What are some study tips for tackling esoteric topics and retaining information? How do you store your information, do you write down facts in a journal or highlight and write in the margins of your books? What tips could you offer?
Here is my take on it.
Information precedes knowledge. So the trick is not to seek or try to retain information but knowledge. I think you have to mentally ponder with what you read and not just read for the sake of reading. You must find yourself in constant mental struggle with the material. Not for the sake of retaining information, but for the sake of ultimately gaining the knowledge. This is usually an incremental and ongoing process. One read or one book does not suffice. Once the knowledge is acquired, the information it is comprised off can usually be reconstructed by your thought process almost on demand. So no, I don’t think you should write anything down or try to memorize anything. Unless it was for the sake of some other purpose, like writing a paper that may require certain passages or quotes.
If the knowledge you are trying to retain is related to topics covered on these forums, its a good idea to try to answer questions and explain, with your own words, the knowledge you are trying to integrate.
Whatever works for you. Doesn’t hurt to read the book a few times.
I always wondered how Murray Rothbard did it.
I remember reading that Rothbard subscribed to 7 newspapers and that nearly every sentence within his books were underlined with remarks like “huh”!, or “bull”
I’ve read about using “mind maps” after you read. I haven’t tried that, seems like a waste of time. I’ve read that in law school they use outlines a lot for cases they read. I think that’d be better since you’re writting a summary you can look back at and the act of writting seems to help with retention.
I’ve heard speed reading works. I don’t like to write in any books for resell value, but if I were going to law school or something I might consider it if it helps. Any other thoughts or tips would be greatly appreciated.
“I remember reading that Rothbard subscribed to 7 newspapers and that nearly every sentence within his books were underlined with remarks like “huh”!, or “bull””
I think he also did that with every book. The important books had almost every line underlined.
I think that one of the most helpful practices to do is to restate the important arguments that you read in their fullest form possible. People often think that, if you don’t have anything “original” to write, you should just stick to writing fragmentary notes in a journal, which tend to remind you of the arguments but be incoherent to other people. But I disagree. If I am reading what I think is an important, elegant, and convincing argument, I will try to restate the entire thing in the clearest and most concise way possible but in my writing style. In fact, If I can’t think of a better way to write a part of it, I literally just copy what they wrote. It doesn’t matter to me whether it would seem to other people that I am just copying or “parroting” what they wrote. My only standard is whether or not the way that I am writing it is the best way that I can think of.
I think that the reason why people tend to hold that opinion is because of the copyright system. With the system in existence, to write something that people are going to pay attention to, you have to write it so it is original enough that it doesn’t get struck down by the copyright system. Which makes people tend to forget that it of course is possible to make a piece of writing better by just slightly tweaking it instead of rewriting the entire thing, synthesizing the works of many different people so the contribution of any of those people is dissipated enough to allow you to evade the arm of the copyright system, or making the majority of it original.
When I was in middle school and high school, I found it bizarre and ridiculous that, when they assigned us papers to do, the teachers always wanted us to “change the wording” of information that we found but then cite it. Why should we change the wording? What if the way that I found it is the best way of wording that I can think of? It seemed like “cheating”, like we were changing the wording just to look like we were being more “original” than we really were. Why not just be honest? I felt ridiculous sitting there trying to figure out how to state it differently when I usually couldn’t think of a better way to do it. When you’re not a good writer having developed your own style, however the person worded what you found feels inescapable, like it is the best way to write it.
With the destruction of the copyright system, I think that this bias will disintegrate, I think that people will stop identifying writing and the ideas of the writing so strongly with an individual of a group of individuals and ideas will become more “autonomous”. Large numbers of people will start colloborating on projects with no central plan, just as a spontaneous, undesigned order, tweaking the writing of each other to create the final product. People will feel okay about “parroting” most of something and changing only the content of one example or the clarity of one paragraph. People will stop feeling like messing, for example, with the wording of Murray Rothbard, is blasphamy, and start thinking of it as a good exercise and maybe even a way to improve what he wrote. In fact, we are already seeing things like that happening. The open source movement, including, most importantly, the Ludwig von Mises Institute, Wikipedia, and others, are heading people in that direction and putting stress on the copyright system.
(By the way, to see a good example of that reaction of “blasphamy”, check out this link where a guy does a “techno remix” of the 5th symphony of Beethoven only to get buried under tons of pages of flaming of people saying, for example, “WHY THE FUCK WOULD SOMEBODY REMIX OR EVEN TRY TOUCHING A MASTER PIECE LIKE THIS…AND TRY TO MASKE IT BETTER???”, “Beethoven would be rolling in his grave”, and “Why would someone want to take this masterpiece and completely ruin it?”.)
The other point that I want to make is that people often think that they should be able to read the work of someone in one percent of the time that it took the person to write it. What ridiculousness. People who say things like that they “read one book per day” are either reading bad fiction or fooling themselves. Does anyone write one book per day? If not, you probably can’t get much from reading one per day. In fact, when I read a book straight through, I do so only to familiarize myself with the content, never to pretend that I got everything that I wanted from it. People have ridiculous expectations about how fast they should be able to read books. By contrast, I spent a few hours per day for over 6 months just to get through the first 232 pages of Human Action; yet I am still constantly going back to those pages because my understanding of them is still very undeveloped and unstable. It is true that Human Action is an extreme case. But my point still stands.
Interesting, I think the way in which I learn things, as well as the method I revise is very similiar to I Ryan’s. I think what I often do is read a section of a book, try to understand the meaning of what is being said, the logical chain of reasoning involved, why one statement must necessitate the next etc. Once I think I’ve gained an understanding of what’s been said. I close the book, or put it away, and try to reproduce the same results and attempt to see how I may reason the same results myself. I find this method useful for mathematics, logic, physics or economics(praxeology). Indeed, the paper I recently started writing on the law of returns grew quite organically from me basically wondering how the statement of that theorem could be generalised and represented, as well as the mechanics involved in the proof MIses makes of it.
When I produce a good piece of writing, I usually have written a rough version first from which I produce the neat typed up. The rough versions are sometimes, not much more than scattered notes, though they’re useful for me, since I know where to look in order to compile the final product. That said, I haven’t updated my blog in about 6 months, and still need to work on my abillity to finish the things I start. I can’t help it, I have like about a thousand different thoughts when I read some sections of Human Action, and want to write them down. I also hate writing in books(I also hate it when people lick the pages to turn them, eugh!), I think it makes them ugly, and so that’s probably why i developed Ryan’s habit of writing notes.
Admittedly, the amount of effort I take in making notes depends on the conditions, and how seriously I take what I’m doing. Sometimes, when the stuff is dense, I just concentrate on biting my teeth and reading through it first before making notes, sometimes I feel notes are essential, otherwise I can’t read any more of the deep stuff. I also have a principle. if the stuff gives you a headache, it means you’re actually using your brain! Admittedly, it could also mean you’re reading nonesense that’s giving you a headache for a reason!
Mind mapping.
By the way, to see a good example of that reaction of “blasphamy”, check out this link where a guy does a “techno remix” of the 5th symphony of Beethoven
That’s just strong aesthetical value to an artistic expression. This will and has always happend, and in this case I would agree with the consensus on that specific reaction.
I really like the methodology I have now. It helped me build up my reading speed (English is my second language).
1rstly. I enter the book or the article in my citations list.
2ndly. I add whatever I find correct, new, useful, etc., etc., to my typed economic notes; I also draw up any graphics using a CAD program so that I can make in-image comments and citations, resize, or make 3-D surfaces in one file.
3rdly. I color code font of citation according to my impression of usefulness of the book in my citations list.
4rthly. I decide what to read next by looking at whom the authors of useful books cited.
Rinse and repeat.
Example: between Thursday and Monday I read 13 books on Soviet statistics and 28 articles (by many of the same authors). Now, I have a working data set of actual (as in, not falsified by the Soviet government) data about the Soviet economy 1913-1990 and Russian economy 1990-2005 (and I needed some of the data for an Econ class, however. Probably, I’ll post it here when I do some work with it.)
I don’t know. Usually with me- it takes me a long time to learn something. I’ll read it, and, then, it’ll take me a few days to grasp the significance of it- unless it’s something I can directly relate to. For a few examples- I’ve read various books- The Road to Serfdom- it took me a month or so to grasp the full meaning of it. I just wasn’t sure if it was sattire, or, something else. It took me a while to realize that we’ve gone a long ways from when people believed in the individual. Now after having done more thinking about it we’ve headed more to a collective, where, individuals don’t matter- and it’s only the collective that has any say. They think that public opinion will control the individuals with public policy and through their planning they think is best they control others.
I also read Failed States by Noam Chomsky, and it took me a long time to grasp the full meaning of all of the things that was said in the book. I basically was reading it for fun at first, and, I just quite didn’t know what to expect. That said, it fully woke me up to the extent to the conseequences of modern imperialism.
Right now, I’m going through a similar experience when I’m reading On Liberty by John Stewart Mill. In it he talks continuously about people who want to ban anything they don’t like because they are bigoted to it. People of religious opinions want to ban other religious opinions they don’t like, and, he talks about how there are people who want to just regulate any moral code of conduct not because it’s harmful to others as in with violence, but, just simply because they want theirs to be fit to their own moral standards.
I usually have a hard time believing these things unless I discuss them with the people that proport the opposite view of the authors discuss. Usually when I do that, then, the meaning of the book will not be lost, with what I read. That’s what I pretty much do for books.
As for school- when I learn in class I try to do a lot of thinking about a lot of theoretical things. I ask questions to see if my questions stand up to what the professor’s understandings of it is. If I have a question I’ll ask it.
I try to balance my time, and, not focus too much on one thing, and, I do a lot of thinking about all of the things and that’s how I don’t forget things. I tend to do a lot of thinking- so- if I were to not do the thinkign I would forget things, but since I do- I tend not to.
“I remember reading that Rothbard subscribed to 7 newspapers and that nearly every sentence within his books were underlined with remarks like “huh”!, or “bull””
I think he also did that with every book. The important books had almost every line underlined.
So Rothbard kept up with current events and read things he knew were completely wrong. That makes me feel better about reading The Economist. It is useful to read propaganda and “bull” as long as you know it’s there and understand the true meaning and implications.
It’s also funny that he underlined everything, because teachers always tell you to avoid underlining too much and only pick out what’s really important.
Overall, my impression is that Rothbard was basically a genius who could absorb, retain, and interpret information on a level beyond us mere mortals. He was certainly a hard worker, but he possessed a level of natural academic talent that most can never hope to achieve.
“I remember reading that Rothbard subscribed to 7 newspapers and that nearly every sentence within his books were underlined with remarks like “huh”!, or “bull””
I think he also did that with every book. The important books had almost every line underlined.
"So Rothbard kept up with current events and read things he knew were completely wrong. That makes me feel better about reading The Economist. It is useful to read propaganda and “bull” as long as you know it’s there and understand the true meaning and implications.
It’s also funny that he underlined everything, because teachers always tell you to avoid underlining too much and only pick out what’s really important.
Overall, my impression is that Rothbard was basiclally a genius who could absorb, retain, and interpret information on a level beyond us mere mortals. He was certainly a hard worker, but he possessed a level of natural academic talent that most can never hope to achieve."
A normal person can work 5 times harder than Rothbard did and still won’t be able to have a output like he did. Not to mention coming close to the quality of his writing.
Hmm, I never really study. I just read and listen to lectures. The stuff I care about just sort of stays with me. I suppose part of it is that capital theory is more interesting to me than talking to people or playing video games.
Rothbard had good memory retention, but so did Adolph Hitler, so I woudln’t say that sets him out as any sort of genius. He was smarter than the average bear, but some of his primary theories are ridiculous, so I’d hesitate to give him much praise beyond: “decent economist, with an encyclopedic memory..” I mean, really, his work on the Panic of 1819 is about the only thing I think was really original about any of his work. Otherwise he was doing more scholarly (research) and intellectual work.
In response to the OP, I’m not sure I have any useful advice. But it seems like you are ahead of the game in terms of having a wonderful website to display your work, and a healthy appetite for reading and writing.
Maybe you are somehow meant to finish what you finish, and retain what you retain. When I write on my own, I tend to do my best work and finish the job when I am truly inspired by the topic. Otherwise, the project never gets past the note-taking stage. I spent months taking notes for all kinds of novels and short stories, and nothing ever came of it. I felt constantly discouraged and depressed that I was “lazy” and “lacked a work ethic.” Then I started researching global warming, and ended up writing a ten page position paper in 48 hours that I am very proud of.
Rothbard had good memory retention, but so did Adolph Hitler, so I woudln’t say that sets him out as any sort of genius. He was smarter than the average bear, but some of his primary theories are ridiculous, so I’d hesitate to give him much praise beyond: “decent economist, with an encyclopedic memory..” I mean, really, his work on the Panic of 1819 is about the only thing I think was really original about any of his work. Otherwise he was doing more scholarly (research) and intellectual work.
Maybe you’re right. He was a brilliant intellectual, but he didn’t come up with anything like the theory of relativity. What amazes me is the way he analyzes and interprets history in such a unique manner. Which of his primary theories do you find ridiculous? Anything besides natural law?